by David Weber
"Well, that's worth knowing," he said, vaguely surprised by how normal his own voice sounded. "And I'm thinking it's yet another reason for my folk to not be trusting any wizards-with one exception, maybe." He grinned crookedly at Wencit and deliberately changed the subject. Or, rather, returned to an earlier one. "But you were saying as how the elves were 'created' after the First Wizard Wars?"
"Hm?" Wencit twitched his shoulders. "Oh. Yes, I was." He rubbed an eyebrow, marshaling his thoughts and obviously grateful for Bahzell's question.
"The main difference between the elves and the races which came before them," he said after a moment, "is that they chose to become a separate race. You see, before Ottovar imposed the Strictures, there was a group of magic-users known as warlocks or witches. The main difference between them and what we call wizards today-or, more properly, wand wizards-was that a warlock didn't spend years in study and didn't evolve elaborate techniques for manipulating the energy about him. His approach to the art was much more… basic than that, because he saw it more clearly. In a sense, he was directly linked to the energy much as your ancestors were, Bahzell, but in a different way. It didn't sustain him; instead, he was able to manipulate and use it much as the stoneherds use sarthnasikarmanthar. The effects they could achieve were far less spectacular than a sarthnasik could produce, but they weren't limited to stone, and they'd been very useful as a sort of magical support troops for the wizard lords Ottovar had vanquished.
"Unfortunately, it was much more difficult to police warlocks than wand wizards, which posed a problem for Ottovar and Gwynytha's Strictures. It wasn't impossible, but it wouldn't have been easy, and, frankly, the use of their abilities came too easily to them. It was highly unlikely that they could have renounced their use even if they'd wanted to, but Ottovar and Gwynytha hadn't spent centuries fighting to impose some sort of restraint on the unbridled use of the art just to see that restraint destroyed within a generation or two. So they made a bargain with the warlocks. They created a spell-according to Yanahir, it was Gwynytha's work, and it must have been an incredible feat-which changed the warlocks' talent into something very like your own people's link to the magic field. The warlocks gave up sorcery… and in return, they received immortality." He smiled-a wry, bitter twist of the lips. "I don't think it was a bargain I would have made. Immortality would give me too long to remember what I'd given up to get it."
"But you're already-" Vaijon blurted, then clamped his jaw shut. Wencit looked at him, then smiled more naturally.
"Immortal, Vaijon?" He laughed. "Oh, no. Wild wizards live a long, long time, but we're not immortal. And the elves truly are, you know. They can be killed, and they do die, but unless they're murdered or die in battle or of a disease or in an accident they truly can live forever. Not that they do. In time, even immortality can become a curse, and eventually most of them choose to die.
"But-" he shook himself "-that's how the elves became the fourth Race of Man. I don't suppose-" his smile became a grin "-that I have to explain where the half-elves came from, do I?"
"No, I'm thinking we've all a fair enough grasp of how that's after working," Bahzell assured him dryly.
"Good. As for the halflings, they're obviously a true fifth race, but I have to admit that I'm not entirely certain what constitutes their 'cleft point.' I'm inclined to think it was simply the amount of raw wizardry their ancestors were exposed to. People too close to unshielded workings of the art can be… changed, and the Carnadosans often ignored their responsibility to shield others from the emanations of their spells. My best guess is that the halflings are descended from the servants and slaves of dark wizards who were sloppy about shielding… and I'd also guess that's where the magi come from, as well."
"Um." Brandark nodded slowly, eyes half closed as he considered all he'd just learned. "That's quite a lump of information, Wencit," he said finally, "not all of it exactly pleasant. But it does explain a few things I've wondered about in the past."
"But not the Purple Lords," Kaeritha put in. The others looked at her, and she shrugged. "Half-elves breed true, and they've existed almost as long as the elves themselves. Why aren't they considered the fifth race instead of the halflings? And why don't any other crossings between the races breed true?"
"Actually, half-elves only 'breed true' with elves or other half-elves," Wencit told her. "I sometimes think that's one reason the Purple Lords are so arrogant. Their ancestors deliberately chose to breed a new Race of Man, but none of the others have ever acknowledged them as such. They certainly think they should have been known as the 'fifth Race of Man,' but if they truly constitute a race at all, it's an artificial one. If they were to interbreed with humans or dwarves, they'd quickly disappear once more."
"They would?" Kaeritha sounded surprised, and he nodded.
"Certainly. Any of the Races of Man can interbreed with any of the others, Kerry. It happens more in Norfressa than it did in Kontovar-the Empire of the Axe is proof of that-but it happened even there upon occasion. Of course, there could be problems. For example, crosses between dwarves and elves tend to be very short-lived, and the offspring of human and hradani parents are sterile. For that matter, so are the children of elvish and hradani or elvish and dwarvish parents."
"Sterile, is it?" Bahzell rumbled.
"I'm afraid so," Wencit confirmed. "And where the human-hradani crossing is concerned, it may be just as well for the rest of the Races of Man!" Bahzell glanced at him quizzically, and Wencit laughed. "If they weren't sterile, Bahzell, they'd probably end up ruling the world."
"What?" Brandark pricked up his ears. "And why would that happen?"
"Just for starters, they live even longer than half-elves," Wencit said dryly, "and they normally inherit the best of both their parent stocks."
" 'The best'?" Kaeritha repeated.
"Well, I think so," Wencit said. "They get the strength and toughness of their hradani parent, along with the hradani link to the magic field, but some of them also get the one thing which sets humans apart from all the other Races of Man."
"Which is?" Brandark asked.
"Wizardry, Brandark," Wencit said softly. "Ever since the days of Ottovar the Great, there hasn't been a single dwarvish, elvish, or hradani wizard. Every single one of us has been human… or at least half-human." He smiled again, sadly. "So you see, we're the ones to blame for the Fall, aren't we?"
Chapter Fifteen
The Dwarvenhame Tunnel measured ten leagues east to west, and it covered that distance in an arrow-straight line. The sheer scale of it was so overwhelming that the travelers were unable to find anything against which to set it in perspective, for it was more than their senses were designed to cope with.
Every so often, however, they came up against something which forced them to recognize its magnitude. Like the underground river which poured out of the northern side of the tunnel, fuming and roaring in its rough, craggy bed. Lantern light struck the white-lashed black of the buried water as it boiled and leapt beneath an arched stone bridge, and Bahzell stood for several long moments peering over the bridge's balustrade and feeling the fine, fresh spray on his cheeks.
There were other springs and streams, smaller but crystal clear and icy cold, and fascinating shifts and gradations in the tunnel's walls as it pierced different stone strata. Vertical air shafts flung round circles of daylight on the smooth stone floor at intervals, and Brandark drew up under one of them and threw his head as far back as it would go to peer up at the tiny blue circle of sky at its top. He stayed that way a long time, watching light bounce down the endless stone walls of the shaft, then shook himself and refused to look up any of the others they passed.
Bahzell started to twit him for it, then stopped himself, for he knew precisely what afflicted the normally insouciant Bloody Sword. Looking up and up and up that endless gullet had driven home how many hundreds of feet of stone and earth lay above them, and Brandark Brandarkson was ill-suited to imagining himself as no more than an ant.<
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Fortunately, they were far from the only people to use the tunnel. The winter conditions outside it had reduced through traffic enormously, but the tunnel itself offered destinations in plenty. The architects had provided for taverns, inns, and hostels along the way, and the tunnel opened out at intervals into vast, smooth-walled caverns, their roofs supported by fluted stone columns. The first the travelers reached housed little more than a place to stop and rest-a single inn, with attached stables, a remount string for Royal and Imperial dispatch riders, and room to draw freight wagons out of the main roadway to rest draft animals. The place looked cheerful enough, but it was still too early in their day to stop for the night, so they paused only to water and feed their animals, then pressed on.
The second cavern, however, housed an entire small town, and Bahzell and Brandark paused side by side in wide-eyed wonder as they saw it.
The stone walls were honeycombed with elaborately carved and embellished doors and windows that looked out over the cavern's bustling floor from what must be homes. The roadway split to pass on either side of the large fountain that splashed and danced at the center of the cave, and cheerful music and bright light spilled from the doorways of several inns. Other doors-much wider, most with stout locks and loading docks-were obviously warehouses; the rhythmic clang of a hammer sang from a smithy where a burly dwarf hammered out a replacement horseshoe for a waiting rider; and everywhere the two hradani looked, there were people.
It took them several seconds to realize there were actually far fewer people than they'd first thought. Perhaps it was the surprise of seeing so many in one place after so long in the wilderness which made the cavern seem filled to the bursting point, but Bahzell thought not. He suspected the answer was much simpler: that he and Brandark knew this thriving town was buried under countless tons of solid rock… and that none of its inhabitants cared. Or, perhaps even more daunting (if that was the word he wanted), that those inhabitants liked knowing all that ponderous weight lay above them like some impenetrable shield.
A dozen or so children, mixed dwarves and humans, raced past, shrieking with laughter as they jostled and fought in some sort of game played with a large, round ball, and hucksters at "open air" stalls shouted enticements at the newcomers to sample their wares. Five or six dwarves and as many humans grunted and heaved as they unloaded crates from a high-wheeled freight wagon at one of the loading docks. They paused to glance at the travelers, then returned to the job at hand, slinging the heavy crates onto wheeled dollies for others to roll off down the aisles of the warehouse. Lanterns hung everywhere, or so it seemed, throwing a clear light over the entire scene, and a cheerful bubble and froth of conversation, hammers, the chantey-like singing of the warehouse men, of harp music from the taverns and the chaffering of shoppers picking over potatoes, garlic, and apples at the grocers' stalls, filled their ears. Nothing could have been less like the dark, hushed habitations Bahzell had imagined whenever he thought of dwarves, and he grinned suddenly at his own naivety. He'd met Kilthandahknarthas, after all, and traveled for weeks as part of his personal bodyguard, and the mere thought of Kilthan's sturdy, loud-voiced cheerfulness in a "dark, hushed" place was ludicrous.
They found quarters for the night at the Stone Dwarf Inn, whose landlord flatly refused to allow Kaeritha and Bahzell to pay for their lodgings. Nor would he allow Wencit to pay for his… although Bahzell suspected that the rates he charged the rest of their company more than compensated for his generosity. Not that the possibility particularly bothered the hradani. The Order of Tomanāk was paying for this trip, and all the cold nights they'd spent in the wilderness since Sharnā's abortive ambush attempt had saved its coffers more than enough to square accounts.
Still, the unaccustomed ease of the day's travel left both him and Brandark with unexpended energy, and they set out to explore the cavern with Kaeritha and Vaijon for company. Kaeritha had been here before and slipped easily into the role of guide, but it was all as new to Vaijon as to the hradani, and he stared around in frank curiosity.
At first, the inhabitants of the town-which they called Tunnel's End-stared back at the two hradani with equal curiosity and an edge of nervousness to which Bahzell had become entirely too well accustomed. Aside from his ears, Brandark might almost have escaped notice, but no one could possibly overlook Bahzell Bahnakson or mistake him for a human. He'd stripped off his poncho to show his surcoat and left his great sword and arbalest at the Stone Dwarf, yet more than one person eyed him askance anyway, and he snorted with wry, bitter humor at the familiar sight of mothers chivying children out of his path.
"D'you think they're thinking as how I'd like to eat 'em raw, or should I be cooking them first?" he asked Kaeritha, and she looked up quickly at the mingled amusement, bitterness, and resignation in his voice.
"Some of them are certainly ready to expect the worst from any hradani," she replied after a moment, "but most of them-?" She shrugged. "I'd guess it's no more than an automatic reaction to something they've never seen before. I remember how we used to feel when I was a child and armed retainers rode through our village. It didn't matter whose colors they wore, or how peaceable they were. That first sight of them always sent a bolt of terror right through you, because they had swords and we didn't, and if they'd wanted to…" She closed her mouth, dark blue eyes grim, then shrugged again. "It's natural enough, I suppose. Which doesn't make it any easier for you, I'm sure."
She reached up to thump his armored shoulder gently, and he smiled at her.
"Aye, well, I suppose there's a bit of something to that," he said. "And truth to tell, it's no doubt as well for parents to be prudent. Better safe than sorry, as they say, and especially where children are concerned."
"No doubt," Kaeritha agreed, then cocked her head sideways at him. "And do you have any children, Bahzell?"
"Me? Children?" Bahzell looked down at her in surprise, then laughed. "Not a child-and not likely to have one, either, now that himself's been and drafted me as one of his blasted champions."
"The job does seem to eat up your time, doesn't it?" Kaeritha said with a chuckle.
"Aye, it does that. But would you mind my asking why you wondered such?"
"Oh, I don't know. The tone of your voice when you spoke about parents and prudence just now, I suppose. I think you'd make a good father, Bahzell."
"Ha! I've seen what Mother and Father've had to deal with, Kerry my girl, and I've no mind at all, at all, to put up with such myself. And especially not daughters."
"Oh?" Kaeritha's eyes glinted challengingly. "And is there something inferior about daughters, Milord Champion?"
"Nothing in this wide world, Milady Champion," he replied. "It's naught but that it's always seemed to me that daughters are after being the gods' revenge on a father, y'see." Kaeritha cocked an eyebrow, and he shrugged. "He's always all a-twitter lest his little girl be meeting someone just like he was as a lad, and not a bit of sleep does he get thinking of it," he explained with a slow smile.
"I… never quite thought of it that way." Kaeritha spoke very carefully, with the air of one suppressing a bubble of laughter. She cleared her throat, then went on in a determinedly normal tone. "But you do have nieces and nephews, I suppose, don't you?"
"Oh, aye. More than I'd care to be trying to count," he assured her. "Wencit's the right of it when he says my folk're after being less fertile than humans, but we live to be as much as two hundred, so we've time for big families even so. Father's past a hundred and twenty now, and my mother only a few years younger. Between them they've brought five sons and six daughters into the world, with nine of 'em still living and me the next to youngest of the lot. Last count, I was up to ten nephews and eight nieces, but my sister Maritha and my sister-in-law Thanis were both after being in the family way again, so I've no doubt the total's gone up since."
His voice had softened, and he smiled again, this time in memory. Kaeritha returned his smile, but there was an edge of old sorrow in her eyes.
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"I'm glad for you," she said quietly. "My own brother and sister-" She twitched her shoulders and raised a cupped palm, then made a pouring motion. Bahzell nodded and laid one huge hand on her shoulder as he recalled the brief, bitter history she'd recounted in Axe Hallow. She touched his hand with her own for a moment, then inhaled sharply.
"But at least Tomanāk and Kontifrio saw fit to send me to Seldan and Marja," she said. "And thanks to them, I've got at least as many brothers and sisters as you do, and a whole crop of nieces and nephews of my own. It's a good thing, isn't it? Knowing the family is there, even if you can't be with them as much as you'd like?"
"Aye, it is that. And I'm thinking it's a good thing another way, too." Kaeritha looked a question at him, and he flicked his ears at a mother who was hurrying two children out of his path. "It's knowing how I'd feel were any of mine threatened as makes me patient with people like that," he told her.
"I can see that," she said, "but it's different for me. Partly, I think, because people don't tend to think of me as a 'threat,' I suppose, but even more as a reflection of my own childhood. Because Seldan and Marja gave me a family of my own, I know what my mother endured when Father's death left her alone with three children. And it was knowing that that sent me to Tomanāk in the first place, to try and make a difference for some other Kaeritha and her mother."
She brooded in silence for several seconds, then shook herself and looked around, as if taking her bearings.
"Ah! Here we are," she said. "I wanted to show you this place because I know the owners. One of their sons was with a trade caravan that ran into trouble in Rustum last year. He was hurt pretty badly and hauled off to be held for ransom, but the Order caught up with the raiders. I was headed this way on another matter, so I escorted him home afterwards and met his family." She smiled. "I think you'll like them. Come on."
